Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish? • Hacker News Board

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#71

Post by adriand » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:08 AM UTC

vouaobrasil wrote: post #57

The Spanish course is one of the best courses on Duolingo. I took a slightly less-developed course -- the Portuguese course and completed it. At the end of the course, I was able to have basic conversations in Portuguese. I had one half hour conversation where I talked only in Portuguese to an Uber driver and we talked about what he was doing, what he did in his spare time, etc. It was a little rough going at times b…

I had a similar experience, although it's going back a few years now. I'd always wanted to learn Spanish and one year my wife and I were going to Spain in the fall, and then three or four months later we were going to a country in Latin America, and I decided that was the year I'd do it. I started with Duolingo and did it for three or four months before my trip to Spain, and after successfully managing a few basic interactions in Spanish and also being able to easily read signage and simple phrases, I was hooked.

When we got back I continued with Duolingo but also got an online teacher and did a pile of other stuff and by the time we went south I was somewhat conversational. You can't truly learn a language with Duolingo (you especially need practice speaking with someone) but it gave me a great start.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#72

Post by antegamisou » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:16 AM UTC

to1y wrote: post #18

As a bilingual I tend to believe unless you're living in the country trying to learn a language(using any method) is probably a waste of time.

Learning rudimentary components being a waste of time may be a bit of a stretch however expecting to master the language through apps, YouTube tutorials, not using books and physical media is laughable if not delusional.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#73

Post by klodolph » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:24 AM UTC

poulsbohemian wrote: post #22

Something that bothers me both about Duolingo and Rosetta Stone (and similar apps...) is that they don't let you fail enough. What I mean is - when you were first learning your native language, you probably mispronounced lots of things and didn't understand the grammar. But you kept going, learning as you went. Duolingo et al. want you to get the pronunciation of things correct before they will let you go on to the n…

I took a foreign language class in college where our pronunciation was corrected ruthlessly, right down to the accents and stresses we placed in our sentences. It was super helpful for having conversations later on. YMMV, I really liked it. I remember a couple cases where our teacher interrupted the lesson and kept calling on students to repeat the same phrase until we all (or mostly) got it right.

This extended to vocabulary. If I forgot a piece of vocabulary, the teacher would call on me again later in the same class to either make the same mistake or remember it this time.

This was one of the best classes I ever took in college, in any subject.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#74

Post by lake-view » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:27 AM UTC

vouaobrasil wrote: post #57

The Spanish course is one of the best courses on Duolingo. I took a slightly less-developed course -- the Portuguese course and completed it. At the end of the course, I was able to have basic conversations in Portuguese. I had one half hour conversation where I talked only in Portuguese to an Uber driver and we talked about what he was doing, what he did in his spare time, etc. It was a little rough going at times b…

> No online course can ever teach you to become fluent.

I get your point, but with the pace of AI, there's a good chance this statement is not true in 5 years!

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#75

Post by djitz » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:28 AM UTC

digitalsushi wrote: post #7

I, like half of us, took a ton of Spanish in high school, enough to generally stick even without continuing to build it afterwards. I tried Duolingo back before the pandemic was trendy, for maybe a year or so, to keep that streak going. While I don't really feel that it was teaching me very well, I can relay this single anecdote. Duolingo has these stories that it figures you can read, based on the level of your scor…

The first time you finally get to fire off your first short, stupid joke in a new language that actually makes native speakers laugh is one of the greatest feelings ever.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#76

Post by greenie_beans » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:29 AM UTC

lordofgibbons wrote: post #60

Has anyone tried "Language Transfer" to learn a foreign language? I've done a few of the lessons and it's so incredibly intuitive. They use concepts and patterns in the listener's native language to learn concepts in the target language. Surprisingly, It's completely free (please donate if you can) https://www.languagetransfer.org/complete-spanish

i've tried but didn't keep up with it. it seemed promising at least.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#77

Post by simlevesque » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:34 AM UTC

aeyes wrote: post #63

When I did the full Spanish tree from zero about 5 years ago studying ~1h per day for 3 months it didn't get me very far. I then moved to a Spanish speaking country and started taking 4h of language classes per day immediately. I felt that I could have learned about the same in two weeks there instead of using Duolingo. Some people came in with 0 knowledge and could speak a little after 2 weeks, Duolingo never got me…

> Back in the day Duolingo was already a very slow progression repeating stuff you already knew endlessly.

This is the only way to learn. You repeat things you know many times to commit them to your memory.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#78

Post by remarkEon » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:35 AM UTC

lake-view wrote: post #74

vouaobrasil wrote: post #57

The Spanish course is one of the best courses on Duolingo. I took a slightly less-developed course -- the Portuguese course and completed it. At the end of the course, I was able to have basic conversations in Portuguese. I had one half hour conversation where I talked only in Portuguese to an Uber driver and we talked about what he was doing, what he did in his spare time, etc. It was a little rough going at times b…

> No online course can ever teach you to become fluent. I get your point, but with the pace of AI, there's a good chance this statement is not true in 5 years!

I don’t think so. Some people can pick up languages relatively easily, and some people can’t. I don’t really know how AI could solve this, unless you mean that the AI can ferret out your gaps and tune the program to your learning needs. Isn’t this what Duolingo tries to do? Genuinely asking. I pay for the “super” Duolingo for no ads and unlimited learning because I’m kind of addicted to it, but I plan trips to Germany every year because you really do need immersion to get to even basic fluency.

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#79

Post by coldtea » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:35 AM UTC

mikeyouse wrote: post #58

djmips wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the future is AI. If ChatGPT is conversational in several languages it could work as the teacher and it can also look past these mispronunciations and misspellings.

Why would you need to learn a separate language with ChatGPT capabilities in the world? Learn one language well and let the computers translate between that one and the others.

For talking to actual people, you know...

Might as well ask "Why cook when there's delivery?"

Re: Can Duolingo actually teach you Spanish?

#80

Post by simlevesque » Sat, Dec 10, 2022, 4:36 AM UTC

whacked_new wrote: post #10

Recently I encountered a tourist who didn't understand anything I said, but said he's from Korea. Recalling that I have been studying Korean on Duolingo for over a year, I excitedly probed my memory for a few seconds, then finally exclaimed, "annyeonghaseyo!" (hello), then blurted in English, "sorry, I don't speak Korean" Later I encountered a fellow who spoke English. He told me he's from Germany. Recalling that I h…

> But surely, it isn't enough to "know"

honestly, I think the missing part is trying harder than you did in person. Applying what you've learned.